1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to changing or modifying television program broadcast listings, according to preference or local television systems.
2. Prior Art
The United States has a large number of television broadcasting systems, where each system may include two or more television channels or stations. There are also television networks which broadcast their own television programs and also sell their television programs to other television stations and to television cable companies. Many cities or television broadcast areas are serviced by several different local television broadcast stations as well as one or more television cable companies. For example, the city of New York has three television cable companies, publicly broadcasts all the television networks programs and has many local television broadcasting stations. At times different cable companies will broadcast the same television program at the same time but on different channels or channel designations. At times the same television program is broadcast by different cable companies on different channels and at different times. Channel number designations throughout the television broadcast industry are not uniform.
Access by the public to several different television cable companies and to many public television broadcast stations makes the generation of a universal television program listing a highly complex problem. It has been proposed that individual television broadcast listings be published for each cable company and a general television listing be published for public broadcast television programs. This means that people with access to two or more television broadcast systems may be interrogating two or more television program listings in order to determine what is to be seen on television and the most convenient time and channel on which to view the program.